More than 98% of the Rs 2,000 notes have returned from circulation since the announcement of their withdrawal in May last year, minister of state for finance Pankaj Chaudhary said on Monday.
Of the high value notes worth Rs 3,55,858 crore in circulation as of May 19, 2023, Rs 3,48,891 crore came back to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) as of November 1, Chaudhary said in a written reply in the Lok Sabha.
The minister said the note continues to be a legal tender and stipulated RBI issue offices are accepting it from individuals and entities for deposit into their bank accounts.
He said the facility for exchange and deposit of the Rs 2,000 notes was available at all bank branches in the country up to October 7, 2023.
Simultaneously, the facility for exchange has been available at 19 issue offices of the RBI since May last year. These issue offices are still accepting these notes from individuals as well as entities. Moreover, these notes can also be sent from any post office to any of these RBI issue offices for credit to the bank accounts, Chaudhary said.
The Rs 2,000 notes were introduced in the wake of the 2016 demonetisation exercise primarily with the aim to remonetise fast.
Following the announcement of withdrawal in May last year, RBI governor Shaktikanta Das had stressed that the security features of the high-value notes—both 2,000 and 500-rupee notes—hadn’t been breached, and the move was “mainly driven by a need to ensure ‘clean money’ policy” under which old, soiled notes were replaced from time to time.
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